Phil Nickinson

Hey there, everybody! Took a week off from this column last week, as my fingers (and the rest of my body) could hardly move after installing some hardwood floors. Don't let those TV shows fool you -- that stuff is hard. On the plus side, I've decided to wear kneepads 24/7, which should do wonders for those broken joints of mine, previously abused by too many years (and one ACL replacement) on the soccer field, and currently by a few too many inches on the ol' waistline. Don't knock it till you try it.

A few thoughts as we head back into another work week:

  • As I said atop our news post last week announcing the release of Gameloft's The Dark Night, we're all painfully aware of the shooting in Aurora, Colo., just outside Denver. It's a nice little suburb I've been to a number of times, when my maternal grandmother was alive. My question: Should Gameloft have postponed the release? There are arguments on either side of that, certainly. 
  • Oh, and you'd be amazed at how quickly I can (and have, and will again) ban people who think they're leaving funny comments in regards to a dozen people getting shot.
  • So the 16-gigabyte Nexus 7 tablet is back to "Coming soon" status on Google Play. Obviously, something weird happened with fulfillment. For my part, I got the one I ordered on July 3 (though the Nexus Q I ordered with it isn't shipping yet). What's odd is that the two 16GB Nexus 7s I ordered on June 27 -- during the Google I/O keynote, actually, as soon as they hit the store -- are still in limbo. The UPS label has been printed, but that's it. For what it's worth, this is the first time I've ever had an issue ordering a device from Google Play. Countless Galaxy Nexus phones have made it without issue. Is it a Google thing? An ASUS thing? Is the Nexus 7 just that popular?
  • I picked up the Kindle Fire this weekend for the first time since getting the Nexus 7 -- only so I could watch "The West Wing." Amazon created a nice little niche for itself with the Kindle Fire and streaming video, but it's time for the company to open things up onto non-Kindle devices. And releasing a better Kindle Fire (which we fully expect to happen later this year) isn't the answer. Want to put a hurt on Netflix? Get on the iPad. And on Android tablets. And push hard on all the new Windows gear.
  • Some great thoughts from Rene Ritchie on the Nexus 7. The whole "save state" thing doesn't bother me nearly as much as it does him, though, but that could that while I frequently use an iPad, I don't use it as thoroughly and completely as he does. (Or maybe it's just difference in the way we think.)

So what's coming next? Samsung's doing something on Aug. 15. (Good lord, it's almost August already?) We'll be at the IFA conference in Berlin in late August/early September, so there's that, too. And we're already looking ahead to the CTIA conference in San Diego in October.

Verizon is offering the Pixel 4a for just $10/mo on new Unlimited lines

This week I'll be meeting up with the other Mobile Nations editors in Winnipeg, which I'm told is in Canada. (Hey, I just get on the plane ya know?) Exciting things are afoot, and those of you who frequent CrackBerry might have seen the Mobile Nations Passport teaser. This is good stuff, folks.